The Leiden Collection Launches Online Catalogue

In January 2017, the Leiden Collection will publish an online catalogue, developed under the supervision of Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., Curator of Northern Baroque Paintings at the National Gallery of Art, Washington. The catalogue is intended to be among the most useful reference works of its kind. In addition to making images and information about all works in the collection available to an online audience, the catalogue includes scholarly essays about aspects of the Collection, the art of the Dutch Golden Age and individual works. The authors of the essays include, among others, Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., Walter Liedtke, the late curator of European Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Adriaan Waiboer, Curator, National Gallery, Dublin, Ariane van Suchtelen, curator at Mauritshuis, Wouter Kloek, emeritus head curator at the Rijksmuseum, Peter Schatborn, emeritus head of prints at the Rijksmuseum, and David De Witt, chief curator of the Rembrandthuis.

About The Leiden Collection

The Leiden Collection is among the least well-known major collections in the Art World. Though heretofore almost entirely anonymous in its loans, since its early days the Leiden Collection has emerged as the only lending library in the Old Masters; over 170 loans of artworks have been made to date to major museums in Europe, the United States, and Japan. Until now, however, the owners’ discretion has meant that no overview of the Leiden Collection as an ensemble has yet been presented to the public. Overview The Leiden Collection is the world’s largest private collection of artworks of the Dutch Golden Age, comprising some 250 paintings and drawings. Named in honor of the city where Rembrandt was born and began his career, the Leiden Collection focuses on Rembrandt and his school but spans five generations of 17th century Dutch painting. Its comprehensive representation of the Leidenfijnschilders (fine manner painters) and Golden Age paintings, principally portraits, genre paintings and history paintings includes exceptional works by many of the most outstanding artists of the period. Notable holdings include 11 paintings and 2 drawings by Rembrandt (the largest collection of the artist outside a national museum), as well as 7 paintings by his circle or studio, ‘Young Woman Seated at a Virginal’ by Johannes Vermeer, 13 paintings by Gerrit Dou, 15 paintings by Caspar Netscher, 8 paintings by Ferdinand Bol, and 11 paintings by Jan Steen. Take a look at The Leiden Collection’s catalogue here.

About Dr. Thomas S. Kaplan and Daphne Recanati Kaplan

Dr. Thomas S. Kaplan is an American entrepreneur, global investor, philanthropist and art collector. He is the Chairman of The Electrum Group LLC, a New York City-based investment, advisory and asset management firm with a focus on the natural resources sector. Dr. Kaplan and his wife, Daphne Recanati Kaplan, began to collect the art of the Dutch Golden Age in 2003 and within a few years established The Leiden Collection, the largest and most important assembly of 17th-century Dutch art in private hands. The Kaplans’ collecting began with Mrs. Kaplan’s early engagement with 20th Century modernist design, an area in which she assembled one of the finest collections of the great French and Italian masters of the era. The same attention to quality and education informed their collecting of Dr. Kaplan’s passion, Old Masters of the Dutch Golden Age, with a particular focus on Rembrandt and his circle. Dr. Kaplan developed his abiding love for the art of Rembrandt and his circle during childhood visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and, later, to Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum.